Nautunal raised one eyebrow. "Don't let it get you, lad. Listening to
space is apt to make you jumpy. Your friends over at Atomics wouldn't
like that. More than once I've thought I was finding some sort of sense
in all this chatter, but it never pans out. It's just noise. There may
be other inhabited planets besides Zenob, just as Bidagha claims, but
if so, they aren't talking."
"Stop, watch tape," said Pehn. Nautunal shrugged his shoulders, but he
picked up the tape and watched as it trickled through his fingers.
The machine was recording short bursts of energy, separated by distinct
pauses: ".. .. .... ... ... ...... .... .... ........"
"Two and two," remarked Pehn, "are four. Three and three are six.
Four--"
"I know. I've been to kindergarten too. Four and four are eight. Has
your aching face affected your mind? You ought to submit yourself for
treatment."
He reached to shift the scanner, but Pehn grabbed his hand.
"Can't you see? Somebody is trying to show us they know how to add.
Someone out in space. Keep watching. I wonder if they use duodecimal
system, or what? Where is it coming from?"
Nautunal dropped his skeptical pose, and watched the emerging tape in
silence. The growing table of symbols built all the simple additions
up to 10 plus 10, by the laborious accumulation of dots. Then it began
again, systematically, "One and one are two, two and two--"
Pehn turned his wondering eyes on his friend. "Is this trick? Joke you
rigged up for my benefit?"
[Illustration: A. D. 2120: "_Is this a trick?_"]
Nautunal shook his head, and his voice was hardly a whisper. "No. That
stuff is really coming through space--through phase space."
Twice more, the table of additions appeared. Then, after a brief
pause, came simple multiplications. Hour after hour the signals
continued, endlessly repeated, and shortly after midnight the two could
recognize the periodic table of chemical elements, with atomic weights
and numbers of isotopes.
"If those numbers which follow atomic weights are abundances," said
Pehn, "composition of their planet is not quite same as ours. Look how
rare 235 is. Where do you suppose this is coming from?"
"You guess," said Nautunal. He waved his arm towards the transparent
dome through which the stars shone, and grinned. "From little data I
have so far, signals might be coming from somewhere in Weaver, perhaps
from neighborhood of Topaz, but it's too early to be sure of anything."
Suddenly a marked change occurred in the pattern of the signals. The
clear symmetry of mathematics ended and was replaced by a formless
jumble, but a jumble whose repetition suggested that it, too, contained
a pattern if it could once be glimpsed. Meters and meters of tape piled
up, and the young men stared at it in frustration.
Nautunal stood up in sudden decision. "Bidagha is right. There must
be intelligent life in another part of galaxy. We need help, Pehn. We
can't decipher this stuff, and yet it may be key to basic vocabulary.
We need mathematicians, linguists, semanticists. I'll put out call to
director." He lifted a finger to activate the visiphone in his wrist
band, but before touching it he glanced at his friend in some concern.
"But you don't look well. Perhaps you ought to go home and get some
sleep?"
Pehn shook his head. "No, pain will probably be gone by morning, and at
time like this sleep would be only gift from Evil Ones. I'm going to
get Bidagha. He'll be more use to us than dozen semanticists."
"Call him on visiphone."
"You know he can't wear one. He's at Cave tonight, holding Ceremony.
I'll go after him."
"All right, Pehn. But remember, government will probably disapprove of
this business. Whatever you do--don't tell your father!"
Pehn grounded his copter at the outskirts of the city, then turned his
back to the glowing lights and walked north across the darkened fields
towards Cave. The early morning sky blazed with stars, and ahead of
him, low on the northern horizon, gleamed the sprawling constellation
of Weaver. He had never been able to force his imagination to see many
of the constellations in their completeness, and in the patterns of
stars which his pastoral ancestors had conceived as Weaver, Sower,
Horned Toth, he could see only random clusters of suns. He watched it
now, as he walked over the rutted earth, and suddenly the pattern took
shape, so that he could discern the old lady's Shuttle, and at its
tip that brilliant yellow star, Topaz, which might that very moment
be sending its signals through the galaxy. How many planets revolved
around Topaz?
He stopped, for the field ended in a sharp bluff which descended to a
narrow valley. Across the valley's floor was the entrance to Cave. He
could see the bobbing lights of candles, down there, and hear a muffled
chant of many voices. He hoped Ceremony would end, soon, so that he
could consult his friend. Once again he felt impatient that Bidagha
should have to be met in person just because, as a Healer, he could
not wear a visiphone into Cave. Bidagha was really more progressive
than many scientists. But the culture of Zenob still had a strongly
anti-materialistic, one might almost say anti-scientific tinge, and no
machine of any kind could ever be brought into any of Sacred Places.
Cave had been the chief place for the ceremonies of those living in
Lahzen area for so many thousands of years, that even the historians
did not know of a time when it was not in use. It was so old, some
heretics said, that it had outlived its usefulness, and was not even a
safe place to be in.
The stars were fading, and the northern sky was paling when
the chanting stopped in Cave below. People filed out silently,
extinguishing their candles as they reached the opening, and last of
all came the Healer.
"Bidagha!" Pehn called softly. "Up here!"
The tall figure paused, then ran lightly up the steps out in the
sloping hill.
"Has something happened?"
"Hurry. My copter is waiting back there, and I'll take you to signal
dome. Then I'll have to go home. If I'm not there for breakfast, my
father will begin another lecture on depravity of youth."
Bidagha's eyes twinkled. "Premier Karn _is_ pretty conscious of his
responsibilities to nation, Pehn, but perhaps eighteen years ought to
be more respectful of fifty. I am nearly latter myself, you know. But
what has happened?"
Pehn raised his arm and pointed towards Weaver. "We're getting signals.
We think maybe they come from some planet of Topaz."
Bidagha clasped his strong hands on his breast. His black hair, curling
over a high, olive forehead, was held in place by the narrow green
band of his calling. Under his little mustache his mouth was firm and
serene, and his gray eyes were exalted as he stared at the fading
yellow star.
"At last!" he said.
* * * * *
The bluish sun of Zenob had risen by the time Pehn got home. He sat
through the family breakfast with his parents and his sister, thankful
that his night's absence had apparently not been noticed.
Pehn's father, old Premier Karn, represented, the old man liked to
think, the ideal of Zenobian maturity. The placidity of his mind was
reflected in the soft roundness of his unlined face, and his full
lips curved at the corners in perpetual contentment. Like most of his
countrymen, he had never felt any conflict between his own impulses and
the customs of his society, and never in his life had he needed the
ministrations of a Healer.
In his usual benevolent mood this morning, Premier Karn entertained
his family with his meditations on his favorite theme, the glories of
Zenob's history and the perfection of her knowledge. They listened
to his remarks in patient silence. As he sipped at his last cup of
fragrant _akhlai_, he tried to make a kindly remark to his son.
"And what progress is your institute making towards practical atomic
power, Pehn? Foundations of this work were laid down more than two
hundred years ago, and government would be glad to have demonstration
at any time."
"We're little uncertain, sir, when that will be. We want to be sure,
before our first trial, that we have checked against even vaguest
possibility of starting widespread chain reaction."
The Premier frowned, set down his cup, and touched his napkin to his
lips. "But how could this occur?"
"It is not at all likely. But if, for example, as has been suggested,
crust of our planet should contain large quantities of some heavy
element with properties we don't know about, something related to 235
or 238 for instance, and easily fissionable, our very first trial might
prove disastrous."
"Nonsense, nonsense!" said the Premier. "Complete chemistry of our
planet was worked out and tabulated more than three hundred years ago.
There were great chemists in those days, and since then no further
research has ever been necessary. There could not possibly be any
elements which we don't know about. It is not seemly for you young men
to be questioning work of great geniuses of past."
Pehn's sister, Soma, had been silent, as befitted a woman. Now she
said, "Father, I have been told that long time ago, Sarkar Talat, after
life spent in philosophical research, gave Warning to government--"
"Trouble with you, my dear," and the Premier patted his pretty
daughter's arm, "is that you don't realize women usually lack spiritual
insight necessary to interpret veiled words of Ancients. Of course I
admit our Healers can foresee future, but they don't always describe it
in unambiguous language. Actually, Sarkar issued _two_ Warnings, but
they obviously did not mean what they seem to at first glance. First
was, that we are in danger because we only think we have mastered all
basic knowledge. Second was, that there are undoubtedly other worlds in
universe, and one of them will one day affect destiny of Zenob. Taken
at face value, these are obviously both false. As to first, no new
knowledge has been added to our sciences for generations, in spite of
fact that Ainta ages ago showed us how to use faculty of precognition.
As to second, it is clearly foolish to think Sarkar meant other worlds
in physical sense. He must have meant spiritual worlds." He turned
again to Pehn, who had risen from the table and was waiting politely.
"When can we have that demonstration? Within month?"
"I'll speak to director today, sir." The throbbing in his cheek was
becoming evident again, and he touched his face gently.
"What's matter, Pehn?" said his mother.
"Nothing. My face hurts, little."
"Ignore it!" his father ordered. "I won't have any maladjustment in
Lord Karn's family!" He picked up the gold-headed cane which was his
badge of office, and strode out of the room.
Pehn managed to spend a second night with the sleepless group of
experts at the signal dome, but fatigue, and the growing pain in his
cheek sent him home again just before dawn. Softly he ran up the ramp
to the second floor and into his bathroom, to the medicine closet.
In Pehn's family, a transient illness was an embarrassment, a
persistent illness a disgrace. It had always been his mother's pride,
and his father's boast, that in the Karn household the contents of the
medicine shelves were never needed, and that the doors of the cupboard
remained closed from one year to the next.
It was with a sense of guilt, then, that Pehn pressed a spot on the
green-tiled wall to slide back the cupboard doors, and picked up an
ivory box, from which he took a bolus of pain-killing plant extract.
He swallowed the huge pill, then took another. A double dose, this
time, for he knew the pain would never yield to anything less. He stood
shivering for a few moments, waiting for the drug to take effect. He
looked up, and realized that his sister was standing at the open door,
watching him sympathetically.
"Pehn," she said, "you're ill. Won't you talk it over with me?"
"I would talk it over with one of Evil Ones if I thought it would help
this pain. It grows worse and worse."
"Have you told Father yet? He could arrange for Healer--"
"No!" he shouted. "I don't want him to know. He'd only begin lecture
on his shame, his gray hairs, how all pain comes from unruly mind, why
don't I put myself in tune with group--old familiar story. But I know
this is something different."
"But Pehn! You know yourself, surely, that since you've got into
Atomics Institute, you have changed. You aren't perfectly adjusted, any
more. You worry about things."
He touched his swollen face and smiled at her placatingly.
"Don't worry, Soma, or you'll get lines in your forehead, and Father
could never bear shame of having _two_ maladjusted children in family.
I'm stronger than you think. Last year when I passed Fire Test, I stood
flames longer than any of boys in my class, longer even than Nautunal.
But this is different. Trouble with Zenob is that we don't have any
biology or any real medicine."
"Pehn! How can you say such things? Your best friend is Healer."
"You know I haven't anything against Healers. But only ailments they
can cure are those that originate in mind, and they can't really do
anything for purely physical ailments. Bidagha has admitted as much to
me. He wants to change all that--he thinks time is ripe."
"But Pehn, our Healers can foresee future. You know that Ainta Penab
proved that, five centuries ago."
"Ainta was worst disaster that ever befell Zenob," shouted Pehn. He put
out his hand to restrain his sister, who was attempting to struggle to
her feet in horror.
"Oh, Soma, I guess I'm just heretic. But listen to me. Sure Ainta Penab
proved conclusively that such phenomena as telepathy and precognition
are real. And what was result? Members of Cult used it as argument and
launched campaign to stop scientific research completely. They nearly
succeeded, too. Medical research has never been resumed on any large
scale, and chemistry and physics only in last century."
Soma sighed. "You shouldn't get all excited, Pehn. Come down into
living room, and stretch out on couch. I'll rub your forehead. You may
be ugly old atavism but you're only brother I have, and I want to keep
you."
In the big living room, Soma drew the curtains from the lucite walls
that looked over the white city. The early sunlight came in, warm and
faintly blue, soothing. She put foam pillows under his aching head, and
drew up a footstool beside him. She stroked his forehead and he was
beginning to doze, lightly, when a muted chime roused him.
He activated his wrist dial, to find Nautunal's grave face looking at
him. Pehn sat up.
"What have you found?"
"Something. Can you come here, now?"